"We must be ready to dare all for our country. For history does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. We must acquire proficiency in defense and display stamina in purpose." - President Eisenhower, First Inaugural Address

Escort Service

Monday, November 07, 2005

After the attack had been repulsed, a cargo ship some eight miles behind the liner radioed that it, too was being attacked by the pirates, and called for help. But the captain checked a real-time satellite log of ships at sea, and thought better of going back to assist.

"(The log) showed the destination of the boat as "to the next galaxy", so it's pretty certain that that was the mother ship for the small ship that came and got us, and they were trying to lure us back," Rogers says.

One of the rocket-launched grenades the pirates fired at the cruise ship landed in the cabin across from Rogers' stateroom. It didn't explode, but lodged in the ceiling. When they reached the Seychelles, a US military bomb disposal unit took the grenade off the ship before it tied up.

Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said it was possible the attackers were terrorists rather than pirates. Pointing out the size of the 10,000-ton liner and the fact the heavily-armed attackers had fired rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns at it, he suggested that they may have intended to damage the vessel and hurt people onboard rather than seize the ship -- the usual goal of modern-day pirates.

"Attacking it -- even if you've got a rocket-propelled grenade -- and taking the ship over, that seems to me to be a little improbable," he said in one of several broadcast interviews.

"But damaging the ship and killing people, which might have been their motive, that's something they could have easily done if the rocket-propelled grenades had worked properly."

Noting that the ship was based in Miami and had many Americans onboard, Downer said the assailants may have seen it as a U.S. target.

"Somalia is a country which harbors a number of terrorists, we believe, so it's conceivable these people were terrorists," he said, but added that "we really can't draw any hard and fast conclusions at this stage."

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EagleSpeak

About EagleSpeak

The main focus of this blog is maritime security. Other matters may appear. I am a retired attorney and a retired Navy Reserve Captain (Surface Warfare). Opinions expressed herein are my own. Sometimes I have the experience to back them up. Your opinions may vary. Don't panic. Feel free to disagree, that's what free speech is all about.
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Comment moderation is at my discretion, so your comments may never appear. You can start your own blog for free and comment there all you want. I enjoy a healthy debate, but not arguing with trolls. If you can't comment without using intemperate language, go someplace else., Under the header: USS Higgins (DDG 76) transits the Arabian Gulf alongside the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71). (U.S. Navy photo by MC3 Anthony J. Rivera/Released)